What’s an SEO Content Writer? (+ How To Find Good One)

Whether you want to build your blog or bring more organic traffic to your website, working with an SEO content writer can help move your business closer to its goals.

Here, you’ll find: 

• What an SEO content writer is 
• What tasks an SEO writer might perform on a typical workday
• How to find a skilled SEO content writer for your business
• Why your company might need an SEO content writer

Marketers already know SEO, or search engine optimization, is a key facet of a successful digital strategy. But to find SEO success, you’ll need to find people who know the ins and outs of this marketing niche.

Learning more about SEO content writers, their skills, and their standard responsibilities on the job can help you find the right match for your team. 

What is an SEO content writer?

An SEO content writer strategizes, writes, edits, publishes, and optimizes online content designed to appeal to search engines. They know how to tastefully target relevant keywords, use a writing style that relates to their target audience, and track the performance of their pieces to improve future marketing efforts. 

Using SEO best practices and trends, SEO content writers can help your website bring in more organic traffic. 

What do SEO content writers do?

SEO content writers do far more in a workday than writing. Each of their daily tasks is crucial to the online presence of the business or organization they work with. 

So, what does a typical day look like for an SEO content writer?

1. Conduct SEO keyword research

Keywords are at the heart of any SEO article. To know what keywords will perform best, writers conduct a hefty amount of research first to determine how their target audience searches for topics related to the brand’s service or product. 

Using SEO best practices and trends, SEO content writers can help your website bring in more organic traffic. (Image: Adobe)

With the help of keyword tools, SEO professionals can even see the volume of searches each keyword receives and how difficult it would be to rank against the competition. This way, they can determine which keywords are most valuable to target first, and which can wait.

With this list of ideal keywords, SEO writers can build out a content plan — creating new pieces of content for keywords that haven’t been targeted yet and optimizing older pieces of content that aren’t performing well.

2. Read up on industry changes and trends

This task is twofold: writers research changes in the SEO world as well as trends in their company’s industry. 

In order to create high-quality content, writers have to be educated about their subject matter. Staying on top of current trends allows writers to create relevant pieces that captivate the attention of audiences. 

To produce the best web content possible, writers must also keep up with the changes happening in the SEO world. Google is constantly updating its algorithms in regard to SEO, and writers have to abide by these changes to keep producing content that ranks well. 

3. Learn about their audiences

Even though SEO copy is focused on appealing to search engines, it’s still critical to keep the reader front-of-mind. That’s why writers spend time learning about their target audiences. 

Writers will gather as much information as possible about their readers to create effective and valuable content. They might research their audiences’ favorite social media platforms, typical hobbies, basic demographic information, and more to create a full picture of their readers. 

Once a writer knows what matters to the reader, they’re better equipped to write an appealing piece that will capture their audience’s attention and draw more traffic to your website. In this way, a writer becomes a strategist, carefully crafting content to appeal to just the right readers. 

4. Study and analyze campaign performances

SEO writers might not be responsible for keeping up with the outcome of every content marketing campaign they work on. But they still spend time looking at those results. 

An SEO specialist should be able to analyze the success of a piece of content or of a marketing campaign as a whole. They can look for changes in your business’s rankings on search engine results pages (SERPs) to see how effective a particular campaign was. 

But being able to identify results isn’t enough. Writers should use their findings to guide their future pieces, improving on each campaign over time. Your writer should also be able to explain how each piece will impact your overall content marketing strategy. 

5. Start the actual content writing!

SEO specialists often return to older work and give it new life. (Image: Unsplash)

It goes without saying that a big chunk of any SEO content writer’s day is filled with, well, writing. 

These writers can create all kinds of content, which might include: 

• Blog posts
• Social media posts
• Infographics
• White papers
• Landing pages or other web pages
• Title tags and meta descriptions
• Product descriptions

Writers might specialize in specific fields like SEO copywriting, which focuses more on gaining web traffic and increasing sales for a company. Standard SEO content writing, on the other hand, seeks to educate readers in addition to increasing SERP rankings. 

On top of creating new content, though, SEO specialists often return to older work and give it new life. Only about 40% of web content today is updated regularly, so if your business isn’t revamping old pieces, a content writer might come in handy.

The effort is worth it: over 50% of respondents to a recent Semrush survey said that improving content quality helps them boost their search rankings. 

Do you need an SEO content writer?

Experienced and talented SEO writers can craft relevant and interesting content that your unique audience will be drawn to. (Image: Adobe)

Every day looks a bit different for a writer in this position, and with so much to be done, it’s becoming more common for businesses to hire SEO writers instead of having a current employee take on the responsibility. 

There is virtually no business that wouldn’t benefit from an improvement in its SEO performance. But do you really need to hire someone to make it happen? 

You might find yourself in need of a content writer if your brand is:

• Creating a new content strategy from scratch
• Experiencing a dip in SEO performance
• Launching a new department or product line 
• Spread too thin to create consistent, high-quality content 
• Looking to connect with new audiences and spread brand awareness 

Good SEO content writers can help you with all these situations and more. While anyone can sit down at a keyboard and crank out an article, only experienced and talented SEO writers can craft relevant and interesting content that your unique audience will be drawn to. 

How to find a good SEO content writer

SEO content writers are relatively easy to find, but finding one that fits your company well is a different story. 

You’ve got quite a few options for starting your search. Job sites like LinkedIn, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, and the like tend to be popular places to begin, particularly if you want to bring on an in-house writer. 

If you aren’t looking for a full-time employee and want to work with a freelance writer, consider freelance hubs such as UpWork and Freelancer. These platforms let you quickly browse freelancers, learn about their experience and pricing, and interview them before beginning a project. 

When you’ve narrowed your search down to a few candidates, here are a few questions you may want to ask: 

• How do you typically conduct keyword research?
• Are you familiar with and/or experienced in incorporating backlinks?
• How do you measure and define success in SEO?
• Are you comfortable repurposing content for multiple audiences?
• How do you keep up with search engine algorithm changes?
• Are you comfortable working with WordPress and similar hosting platforms?
• How do you ensure your content is relevant and engaging for the reader?

Of course, you can’t truly know how talented a writer is without reading their work. Request a copy of candidates’ portfolios or ask for links to past projects so you can assess their writing skills. 

If you have a wide range of content needs and need a long-term partnership with a full marketing team, you might consider working with a content agency. You can ask the same types of questions listed above to get a sense of how your potential agency partner operates. Be sure to also check out their case studies to learn about previous successes. 

The takeaway

Improving your website’s SEO performance is more than worth the time and effort it takes. But when you find a skilled SEO content writer or agency to help, you’ll notice an increase in your web traffic in what feels like no time (after all, SEO always takes time!).

HawkSEM is here for all your content marketing needs thanks to our stellar team and our proprietary ConversionIQ technology. We can help you capture the right audience, capitalize on industry trends, and gather concrete data to guide you forward in the next steps of your strategy. 

Contact the HawkSEM team today to see how we can help.